The von Kármán Lecture Series: 2018

How Will Earth's Ecosystems Survive Under a Changing Climate?

April 12 & 13

One of the largest uncertainties in projections of future climate change is how do terrestrial ecosystems (communities of land organisms and their environments) contribute to or help counteract the rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide. This is because terrestrial ecosystems can both absorb carbon (i.e., photosynthesis) and emit it (i.e., respiration, decomposition, combustion). Whether they absorb or emit carbon depends on a variety of factors, such as temperatures, moisture, nutrients, etc.

At NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL), we are using satellite remote sensing and sophisticated modeling to understand how Earth's carbon, water and nutrient cycles are linked and their impacts on the Earth system as a whole. In this talk, Dr. Fisher will give an overview of the latest remote sensing datasets and model developments from JPL, and discuss new insights into the behavior and understanding of terrestrial ecosystems in a changing climate.